


Midsummer Questing

by Rhyolight



Category: Deryni Chronicles - Katherine Kurtz
Genre: Other, ditto for mentions of God, warning for mentions of unicorn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-18
Updated: 2012-10-18
Packaged: 2017-11-16 13:43:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/540072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhyolight/pseuds/Rhyolight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Joram is wondering about his vocation and no one is wondering about Rhys and Evaine at all.</p>
<p>Written about a million years ago; posted to apologize about a snarkiness.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Midsummer Questing

   “Father, I think you are being completely unreasonable!”

Joram flinched as his sister began the latest scene in an act that was making all the residents of Caerrorie increasingly uncomfortable. It had been raining for twelve days –no, fourteen, he was leaving out the two days’ travel that had brought him home from his studies for the diaconate, soaking wet. The crops were behind – the ploughing and planting had been late, for that matter — and though their winter stores held out well enough to ensure that no one would starve any time soon, the cold, wet spell had everyone worried. The castle smelled of damp clothes, damp bedding, damp kindling, and garderobes in need of draining.

And Rhys was visiting. Joram was never sure whether that made things easier or not. The wedding certainly would, but these days Evaine pined for her betrothed when he was away and both of them pined for each other when he was there. 

Cathan, thank Saint Michael and Saint Genevieve, was at Court. He had tempered his feelings about Rhys, and no longer suggested that their sister could make a better match. Joram loved his sister. Unlike Cathan, who believed all that stuff about women, Joram knew her nature was as passionate as that of any of her brothers. How any Deryni, or any marginally sensitive Human, or hound even, could fail to understand that. . . .

He sighed and checked his shields again, gently. Rhys felt the ripple and glanced over to him; he was trying to read something, choosing between chill nearer to the window and indifferent light nearer the fire, which was smoking. Some Deryni were good at fire; Joram reminded himself to ask Father Emrys when he was back at the school. . . .

If he went back. Evaine’s desire, Rhys’ steadier, calmer anticipation, springtime – even this wet and cloudy one – nagged at Joram, made him wonder about a decision he had believed fully resolved. 

Alister had warned him: celibacy was a decision he would make every day, no matter how many days he had behind him. Whoever desired to offer God that gift would not offer it once and for all, but daily. 

Over the last several months, all the peace Joram had usually felt with his decision to lead a chaste life had crumbled away. That was part of his returning home for the Easter season, to consider the binding vows he would make at Pentecost. He was tired of considering them. At the moment, Joram wanted to be in a particular tavern near the seminary, well-known for the wide choice of wine and the wide smiles of the table maids.

He was a nobleman’s son; his life offered him plenty of choices and mates, within holy wedlock and outside it. His father had enough land. . . . Joram knew his abilities as a courtier were far subtler than Cathan’s and potentially more useful to the Crown. He could be a credit to the family, to the realm, and to God without being a soldier-monk.

If he were going to be a Michaeline, he wanted to be one of the good ones, like the men (and the few he had encountered of the secretive, frightening women in the Second Order of Saint Michael) whom he admired. Their honor made their vows worth more than form or circumspection or things left unsaid. 

Joram avoided chances to risk falling in love — a concept that, for his class, was neither well-developed nor practical. He had deliberately kept himself too busy. He had friends outside his family, but none to whom he would consider permanently, exclusively, attaching himself. He knew from watching Rhys and Evaine that a full-hearted union of gifted individuals took time and effort. The taint around marriages founded on less than mutual respect, at Court or among his age-mates, was familiar and unwelcome. Joram liked to consider himself too good for that, and as a working Deryni and devout Christian, he doubted that he could endure less than love.

He knew enough of the clerics of the less scrupulous kind to doubt that a celibate life actually strengthened magical potential; but it certainly did leave more time to hone one’s skills, to meditate and to try new spells. Joram knew he was ambitious enough for that to matter to him. He hoped God sympathized with his pride in his abilities, that by grace Joram would remember his powers were for service. But was ambition – holy ambition – and the sort of pride in himself based on what he knew of his abilities — were these enough? 

He felt lonely here, though there were people all around him: his sister, working full-time at running the castle and her spare thoughts, as well as some that ought not have been spare, fixed on Rhys; his father, Camber, working on lines of research he had no intention of sharing with a Michaeline, even his son — although Joram knew that Camber shared them with Evaine — and unwilling to distress Joram and argue about his choice of Order yet again; Rhys, trying to keep out of everyone’s way, feeling like a poor relation and also busy as a Healer with the local illnesses and what material he could dig out of Camber’s library relating to Healing and still trying to be close to Evaine. The castle chaplain was some kind of cousin, “a dear man, not confusing about God, like some,” according to Cook, without enough Latin to enjoy Augustine and no Greek or Hebrew at all.

_I am too educated to live here; Father is right about the Michaelines ruining simple piety. I can’t stand it_ , Joram thought despairingly, even while his body, responding to the season, suggested a few things he could still learn about.

The chapel bells rang Terce. Camber put his set of parchments aside. He had appointments coming, rents to arrange, taxes to adjust. Joram could tell Camber was as tired of the weather and his daughter’s arguing as his son was.

“My dear,” he said, and Joram caught the edge of his impatience, “I know you want to go a-Maying, and I do not think it unusual for you to want to ride out with Rhys, and I know very well that you can look after yourself; I am very proud of your abilities and I have every confidence in your discretion....”

More than I do, thought Joram, surprised at himself.

“But I don’t want the two of you out alone. Take your maids....”

“Who aren’t Deryni, who can’t ride as well as we can, who get frightened every time they think they see an adder...,” Evaine said mutinously. “Honestly, Father, we can take care of ourselves better than we can take care of them.”

“I don’t want two Deryni to have to ‘take care of themselves,’ as you put it,” Camber said firmly. “I don’t want our people to know how much you’re capable of.”

“You don’t mind if they know what Rhys is capable of,” said Evaine. “Healers can be as Deryni as they like, and carry swords, and no one says ‘oh, be careful, you’ll scandalize the tenants.’”

“The tenants understand swords,” said Camber. “They don’t understand Healing, but they are willing to accept it. If Deryni are to live in peace, we would do well to be mindful of being stumbling blocks for those who fear that our difference from them is as ill-intentioned as theirs would be in our place. Take some of the men; they’ll enjoy looking after your maids. If it ever stops raining.”

Evaine did not look mollified. Joram understood. She was tired of being surrounded by convention, as well as other people — damp, irritable people who smelled like cabbage and smoke. Although her father’s men-at-arms were respectful of her, they were not the companions Joram would have chosen for a contemplative ride in the woods, or whatever Evaine had in mind. A trained magician needed more privacy than most people, more often. Joram found his in the chapel with the Sacrament. Evaine had always loved the outdoors.

“I’ll go with them, Father,” he said suddenly. “I carry a sword, as well, and no one would think Rhys and my sister easy pickings if they have a Michaeline Knight – even one still in training – riding with them.” He could feel Camber’s consideration resting upon him. “And I think even an older brother will do to preserve her reputation.”

“And the reputation of Rhys, as well,” Camber agreed after a moment. “Thank you, Joram. Does this suit you, Evaine? Rhys?”

“Whatever pleases my lady, and you, my lord,” said Rhys, bowing. He hated to be near his betrothed and her father during their disagreements.

“I hate it when you talk like that,” said Evaine. “Thank you, Joram, and you, Father. I’m going to see if it’s stopped raining. And if it hasn’t, could we go out tomorrow, whether it stops or not? I’m running low on herbs, the garden is late coming on, and the Saint John’s Wort might be out....” She rushed from the room, her lighter mood changing its atmosphere even as she left it.

The men looked at one another, relieved.

“Perhaps she’ll find herself some valerian, as well,” said Camber with a faint grimace. “I’m sorry, Rhys, I just didn’t think it was wise. These are not entirely comfortable times, and although I dislike keeping her away from Rhemuth”— they all knew he meant ‘and the lecherous Imre’—“I know she gets very bored. She’ll do better in a home of her own, though I will miss her sorely. It’s good having all of you here, even at close quarters. How are matters with you, Joram? We’ve not had much time to talk. I haven’t even heard whatever Michaeline gossip you can pass on.”

“Just the usual Godless international intrigue,” Joram said, echoing the opinion of many of Gwynedd’s nobility. He hesitated to say the words he had been carrying around for the past few weeks. “It’s just.... It’s hard, I suppose, with perpetual vows coming up.”

“That’s not what you usually say,” said Rhys. “Doesn’t sound very promising.”

Camber’s face showed similar concern. “Has something happened to change your understanding of your vocation, son?” He was being as gentle as he could, Joram knew. Camber’s opinion of the Michaelines was both better-informed than many of his contemporaries and less patient. Camber said bluntly that he found both their tactics and their spirituality too political to be entirely holy. (The Michaelines preferred to think of it as “engagement in the world.”)

“If you mean, do I still want to be a priest? Yes, I think so, very much,” said Joram. “But it doesn’t feel as simple as it did when I was twelve or fourteen. I don’t think it’s just about celibacy. But that’s where I keep getting stuck.” Now that it was out, he felt a little better.

“I’m glad you’re noticing you’re only mortal,” said Camber. “I hope you’ll mention this again. For the moment, I’ll just say that everything looked simpler when I was sixteen and by the time I was thirty, I noticed it had been simpler when I was twenty. I am hoping things will clear up in my seventies.”

“At least Evaine will be older then, too,” said Rhys wistfully.

 

As though the skies had taken their orders from Evaine, the next day was sunny. By mid-morning, the smells had begun to change: things drying, bread baking, plants beginning to warm in the sun and flowers to release their scent. Their horses were restive and the prospect of following his sister on one of her terrifying gallops lifted Joram’s heart. Rhys looked happier, too. He was no slouch: a fair rider, an excellent scholar, a patient and thorough ritualist, but:

“Being cooped up with your family, Joram, is too much,” said Rhys, checking the girth on his saddle one last time before mounting. “I love Camber, and of course I love Evaine, but....” He hesitated. “It’s too much like being under a burning lens, when they both get into one of those moods.” He did not need to add that Joram, brooding, only made matters more intense.

“They’ve grown closer since Mother died,” said Joram. “And Evaine thinks for herself more than our mother ever did—which is Father’s doing, of course. You don’t provoke her the same way he does, so she won’t be so exasperated with you. Look, Rhys, I don’t know what you and she have done to make Father so....” Rhys mutely hoped Joram would not ask, so Joram continued, “and it’s not my business to ask, but would you both mind, ummm, behaving well enough – not that I don’t think you haven’t been – so that I don’t have to spend too much time looking the other way and humming loudly?”

“Better ask me,” said Evaine, riding up to them.

“Evaine,” warned Rhys.

“Well, Joram, will you spend some of the time looking the other way?” Evaine was genuinely pleading. Joram felt the quick touch of her presence. He loved her, and he had longings of his own, and the church said betrothal was legally binding.

“I may have to go for a walk while we rest the horses,” he said. “A _short_ walk.”

They trotted along the outskirts of the village fields, careful not to tread inside the edges where the seed was coming up. Once away from the houses, Joram felt the tightness in his chest relax as the sun warmed his back. His sister’s and Rhys’s laughter carried on the breeze back to him; separate horses were very efficient at maintaining a discreet distance. 

But they were all happy in the early summer air. He allowed his shields to drop, allowed the world’s energy to appear to him, all but visible, the corona of love and life and joy from Rhys and Evaine surely obvious even to an observer without Joram’s gifts.

Evaine really intended to gather herbs and they stopped several times to cut leaves and stems and fill the sacks she had tied behind her saddle.

“Look, here’s my Saint John’s Wort,” she said. “This is early, isn’t it, Jo? It’s not Saint John’s feast yet.” She blessed herself and the plants before cutting them, the knee-high stalks crowned with yellow flowers.

“Near enough,” Joram said. “I saw a Maypole back there.”

“What do Michaelines think of Maypoles?” asked Rhys.

Joram shrugged. “I’ve heard it said that they are the Tree that lifted up Our Lord, and the bright colors are His blood renewing the face of the earth.”

Rhys was barely too polite to snort. “You know perfectly well it’s the Old Religion.”

“It’s been a long time since the Old Religion condemned any Deryni for being who we are. I wish Christ could say as much for his followers.”

“Joram!” said Evaine. “I’ve never heard you talk like this.”

“You know what Father says about Michaelines. We’re too clever to save our souls.” We, he thought. “Look, I don’t give a fig for the Old Religion, but it doesn’t give one for me, either. I imagine all these people were properly christened. I know Christ died for them whether they were or not.”

“True enough,” Rhys admitted. “But I can’t see it going down very well with old Archbishop Anscom.”

“Neither do Michaelines,” said Joram. “If the Lord showed up in His Grace’s chancery, a lot of tables would be getting tipped. The Old Religion isn’t worth bothering over. I’d rather try to get people to do what they say they believe.”

Evaine tied up the latest bundle of stems and they rode on. They drew closer to the edge of the forest, the trails where Camber’s Court hunted its deer.

“The Old Religion is more than that,” Rhys said finally. “I’ve worked with people who saw — well, someone. And it wasn’t Saint Hubert, or at least there was no crucifix between its antlers.” He allowed his big horse to lag behind, closer to Joram’s, and added under his breath, “And when Evaine is in this mood, she’s not like any of the saints.”

“Does the Old Religion have any better descriptions?”

“At least three,” said Rhys. Joram raised an eyebrow at him. Rhys laughed, causing Evaine to look back at them. She wore an expression so identical to Joram’s that both men laughed.

“What are you two on about?”

“Rhys is having trouble keeping up with MacRories, as far as I can tell.”

“Eyebrow magic,” suggested Rhys. “Have pity on a poor Healer….”

Evaine laughed with them, told her horse to trot, and gave the other two a MacRorie to keep up with. She was the best natural rider of the three, though Joram and Rhys had more practice and the Michaeline-trained horse had his pride to maintain. It was a wonderful gallop. 

 

They ended up not far inside the forest, trotting down a wide trail. They stopped where it came to a small, clear lake; the sweet water was surrounded by pollarded willows. Evaine opened the loaf, a bottle, and brought out the wrinkled apples and loaves and chicken and raisins she had taken from the kitchen. They lay back in the still-damp grass and ate with the sun welcome in their faces. It felt to Joram as if it had been years since he had been so warm and contented. He basked like the turtles in the lake.

The sun was still high when he rose to his feet and stretched. “I think I’ll walk off some of that bread,” he said casually. “I’m as stuffed as a goose.” Evaine and Rhys looked at him with entirely innocent faces. “I’ll be back around the time the shadow reaches there,” and he pointed at a branch.

“Don’t go off too far,” said Evaine. “God forbid you should have to take care of yourself like a Deryni.” Even here, she pitched her voice low.

“I don’t intend that anyone notice me in the first place,” said Joram, “and if you continue to stay in the open, you might want to consider doing the same. And please, keep your clothes on.”

“I think I’m supposed to challenge you for besmirching her honor,” said Rhys, through a mouthful of chicken. 

“Since I’m supposed to challenge you for the same thing, I think we’ll call it a draw.” 

Joram drew a shield close around himself and walked off. The willows were cut often enough to provide a meadow for deer. He walked around one edge of the grass to a trail, narrower than the one they had ridden down, and went into the forest.

Little sun penetrated the thick branches of ancient trees and those of newer ones, fighting for a place in the canopy. But the wood was marvellously alive to his senses. Joram could hear the cries of birds defining territory and frightening would-be predators, nestlings wheezing as their parents returned to feed them with beaks stuffed full of worms and caterpillars, things that munched or flew among the fresh green leaves. Joram was seen by squirrels, who for the most part avoided his gaze, although he felt their observation. A mouse crossed his path, suddenly noticed him and froze in panic, as a weasel came silently out of the brush behind it.

“Be off,” suggested Joram. “I am to be a knight, sworn to protect the weak.” He reached down and placed the mouse carefully off the path behind him. The weasel, almost as dainty, vanished into the brush again.

“And what of my weasel?” came a voice that startled Joram as much as he had the mouse. “Shall she not eat and be satisfied? Her little ones cry out for her milk.”

Joram reached out with his senses, brushing against little lives in the forest around him, but no one his own size. Another Deryni? He could sense no other’s shield, either. He called out, “Will you not show yourself, that we may discuss the matter of your weasel further?”

But no one answered. He cast out with his senses again. Only the wood answered. Perhaps he had been indoors, in the city, too long. 

He set the moment aside and continued down the trail. He knew it from not too many years past, riding with his brother and sometimes his father or sister, helping hunt the deer for the castle’s table, learning some of the craft that not only trained his Deryni senses but also made him a useful member of his father’s household.

Before long, he came to a clearing, a gap along the path really, running up to a huge old stone. It was unlike any others in the area. Joram had always believed it had arrived in the Flood, though he could not recall who had told him so. He had spent hours of his boyhood atop it, commanding a view of the trail, particularly hiding from his tutors when he was twelve. It had been his rock “for all generations,” he thought. It was here he had first realized the call to the priesthood. He wondered if his coming again today would give him some kind of resolution.

He sat down, intending to pray (“How manifold are all thy works!”), but the psalm died on his lips. Nothing belonged to him here. The very concentration of being around Joram struck him to the heart. The intense greenness of the trees served to underline his loneliness, his isolation from his kin and his own hearth. Whether he caught a trace of Evaine’s laughter in the air or merely thought he had, the emptiness within him, beside him, seemed overwhelming, a void that felt like pain.

_This is not myself_ , he thought. “Lord my God, deliver me,” he whispered aloud. “I can see the beauty of the world You made for us to meet You in. It should fill my heart, not leave it so empty. What do You want of me?”

No answer came unless it was a deeper pain yet. Joram choked back a sob. He had known moments and days of sorrow, boredom, anger, desolation; this made them seem like straws in a torrent. Nor did it resemble any psychic attack. This was enough to make him believe in more distinct demons than the most superstitious peasant. He longed to feel his life pour out over the rock where he sat, if only death would bring him peace.

“Son, why are you crying? What are you looking for?” It sounded like his mother’s voice, he realized later. Those may not have been the words, exactly, but they were what he felt breaking in on his loneliness like a distant light.

“I don’t know,” Joram answered, though he could hardly speak. His throat closed with pain. “I don’t know who I am.”

Gentle arms, irresistibly strong, enfolded him, surrounded him. “Joram,” she said. He opened his eyes and looked into a face not quite the same as his mother’s. The woman who held him was older and infinitely stronger, marked by years and sadness and deeper peace. She seemed huge, big enough to hold him like a child of three years. Her hair was streaked with white. Her eyes were deep….

“Ancient of days,” Joram whispered. She smiled.

“I am, that. No need for you to feel the best of your life is gone already.” She held him close as Joram’s breath caught in a sob again. He drew in courage and looked at her again, but his mother was gone. She who held him now was young and lithe — if as old as Joram, then surely no older. Her eyes were green or grey, like stones under clear water. She had long hair. Although he could never put a name to its color, it was as soft as the new-sprouted grass they had passed in the field.

“Lady or – or damsel – who are you? Why are you here?” he heard himself say.

“I am the beauty of the world,” she said. 

A light wind swept through the leaves, scattering sunlight across her face like melting shards of glass. Joram’s senses, Deryni and Human, were engulfed. The wildness, the liveliness, the beauty of the summer and the forest and the woman were their own praise. There was nothing he could add, not even consciousness of his delight or his awe.

He could not tell how long the intoxicated moment lasted. He came back to himself – or thought he did – as the vision folded into a point, a question, a kiss. He had been lost in the green world, formless; now he was lost in someone’s arms, in her breasts, in the scent of her hair, in her warmth. No longer cradled like a child, Joram felt her within his own arms, alive like water flowing beneath their skin, as strong as trees waving in a storm, tossing and bending.

The high winds ceased, dying to billows, puffs of breeze. The pain in Joram’s heart, driven like clouds before the wind, had gone. She kissed his lips once more and stroked the side of his face. 

“Do you know me, Joram?”

“You are the beauty of the world,” he said, fascinated by the light upon the planes of her face, her brow, her eyes. He plunged into those depths like swimming in centuries.

“Joram,” she said, amused. “And no wonder you would meet me like this, on this day of the year, in this place, despite your lack of courtesy. Don’t look so – but there is more to the Mother than just Her Son, just as there is more to my way than righteous deeds.”

Despite his light-headedness, Joram tried to frown; it was too hard.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, I’m afraid.” He smiled at her seriousness and touched her hand to his lips. Her eyes met his gravely across the kiss and watched him with compassion as he felt the wound in the wrist he held. 

Horrified, Joram reached for her other hand and found a matching gash, sticky with blood. Her face began to change as Joram met her eyes; no longer so young or so finely boned, taller than Joram, dark eyes, dark hair.

A moment before he had possessed and been possessed in shattering ecstasy. Joram’s body was still shaken with longing as he looked into a face more mortal than anyone he knew.

_He had no form or majesty that we should look at him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him_ , ran the line through Joram’s mind. That had not mattered to the prophet either.

“Now that you know me,” said the latest stranger, “did you think I would leave you so alone?”

“I was afraid you would,” Joram whispered. “But not now.”

“And now...?”

Joram felt his mother’s love again, seemed to smell the flower-scent the maiden had carried with her. He looked once more at the man in front of him, whose broken hands he still held. 

“I think I know you best this way, Lord.”

“Then come and follow me.”

Joram looked down at the wounded hands. They felt real and strong. He needed none of Rhys’ talents to catch an echo of their pain, which was real, too. Gently, he held them to his heart and lost himself in the dark eyes….

...and slowly Joram woke to normal sight again; alone but no longer empty in spirit. He took his time to start breathing again, familiar with trance but not with ecstasy. He tried out the memory like words in a very foreign language, hoping it would not grow threadbare with too much handling. It was too soon even to give thanks. He was still absorbed in wonder when he heard Rhys come up the path.

“Your shadow’s crossed the branch and gone, Joram,” the Healer called. He looked up and saw Joram. “You said we had to keep our clothes on.… I think your shirt is down here.” He tossed it up to Joram.

“Thanks,” said Joram. “Ummm. The sun felt very good.” He pulled his clothes back on as quickly as he could.

“We were worried about you,” Rhys told him as he clambered back down to the forest floor. “It’s been strange...”

“Is Evaine all right?”

“Yes, certainly... Have you ever seen a unicorn?”

This drew Joram’s attention even now. “Not outside of a book or someone’s crest, no. Have you?”

“It came and put its head in Evaine’s lap. It was kind of surprising.” Rhys hesitated, gnawing his lower lip for a moment. “The more since...”

“Please don’t confess. I’m not ordained yet,” Joram said unkindly. “But it ought to reassure my father.”

“We are not going to tell Camber we saw a unicorn,” said Rhys. “There are whole topics I just don’t want him to get near.”

They missed seeing Evaine sitting next to the lake, until she saw them and dropped the veil of her magic.

“You say you saw a unicorn?” Joram asked. Evaine nodded vigorously.

“I’m so glad Rhys was here, too. It licked my face.”

“And nibbled at my fingers,” Rhys said.

“What was it like? Goaty or horsey?” 

“More like a deer, except for the mane and tail,” Evaine said. She reached over and picked something up: a long, silvery hair. It wasn’t one of hers. She wound it carefully around a finger and put it in the sack of herbs. “More like a unicorn than anything else, I guess. I never knew this was an enchanted wood.”

“I think they all are at Midsummer,” said Rhys. “Or where you are.” They blew each other kisses. Joram’s patience surprised himself.

“Shall we be getting back?” he asked. They mounted their horses, who apparently had not noticed the unicorn.

“I’m sorry you didn’t get to see it,” Evaine said. “It’s too bad you missed the adventure.”

Joram wondered if he should tell them about his own encounter. He wanted time to savor it, to consider, maybe even risk praying about it. 

“I was well refreshed,” he said finally.

 

 

[Author’s note: Although Father Joram MacRorie, OSM, is most widely known for his political activity in the Haldane Restoration and its bloody aftermath, his Order maintains a different view of him. He is remembered in the Michaeline Ordo for his love of God, expressed often in counseling and conversation. Several intense and passionate sermons concerning ‘the wideness of Christ’s embrace’ are attributed to his pen.


End file.
